Separating beauties from beasts

Illamasqua Creator Swatches & Review

Illamasqua Creator is from the upcoming Generation Q Fall/Winter Collection that will be due out September 6.

This is one sexy, edgy polish that I loved wearing, especially on short nails!

With all the colourful lacquers in my Helmer, I just realized after wearing Creator that I rarely wear black polishes. And it’s definitely not because I don’t like them – in fact whenever I wear a black polish (not near-black, but actually black), I tend to fall in love with it.

Illamasqua Creator was no exception – it stole my heart, and if you try it out, too, I think you’ll also want to have its baby…haha, or at least just paint your nails with it. 😉

Where to Buy: Illamasqua website, Sephora stores & Sephora website (Collection is available starting September 6)

Illamasqua Creator Review

Colour

Hehe, I like how Illamasqua describes this polish as a ‘magical black’. That’s definitely true because when I first laid eyes on it in the bottle, I immediately thought of a magician’s cloak. (In fact, quite some time ago, I did Magician Nails featuring a black-and-silver theme.)

I feel that black and silver are classic colours that will always look edgy yet classic together. They’re sexy, hard-hitting, and you’ve gotta love how it’s such an easy colour combination to pair with many outfits.

When wearing a black polish, my philosophy is to go big or go home. Black polishes, in my opinion, should be as dark as night. I’m not a fan of near-black shades. If you want to wear something super dark, actually wear black!

Creator by Illamasqua is indeed a polish with a deep, dark, black base. Love it!

Finish

This polish is chock full of micro-glitter. Most times, the glitter looks silver to me, but sometimes when the angle is just right and the natural light is yellowish (like with light from a sunrise), I can see the glitter take on a slight golden hue.

It’s not a gritty polish at all, but when I ran my finger along the surface of my nails, I could feel slight texture. When you add a shiny top coat, you can smooth it out better, but the subtle texture by itself isn’t something that’s scratchy or annoying.

Because there’s glitter, it’s a little more difficult to remove than a plain creme polish, but this wasn’t nearly as challenging to remove as your typical glitter polish. It came off without as much scrubbing. (It also depends on how many coats you use. If you use 2 coats, it’s not to bad to remove. But, I think if you use 3-4 coats, it’d be much harder.)

Application & Formula

Application on this one was wonderful! You know how sometimes with glitter polishes, the first coat can be streaky and have bald patches where the glitter doesn’t stay? Well, if you use medium coats, you won’t have that issue. With just one medium coat, I was able to almost fully cover the nail…and the tiny glitter applied evenly on its own without any effort on my part.

Despite the great coverage with a single medium coat, I still suggest using 2 coats…and that’s all you’ll probably need.

The formula went on smoothly without any clumps, it was easy to control, and I found that it dried fairly quickly. (Then again, with most glitter polishes, I find that they tend to dry faster than other types of lacquer.)

Pricier than typical polish (but if you really love this colour combination, this formula is superb!)

Final Verdict: 9.5/10

I think that a lot of people wear more black nail polish around Hallowe’en, but it doesn’t have to be that way. Just like how you may feel like wearing a neon in the winter, you can wear a black polish in the summer. Nail polish is supposed to be a fun experience, so wear whatever you want. 🙂

Creator by Illamasqua is a polish that I know I’ll be sporting again. Considering how many nail polishes I have in my collection, that’s saying something!

I feel that the colour combination is perfect and the formula is well done!

P.S. If you want to see promo pictures of the entire Illamasqua Generation Q Fall/Winter Collection, check out my Illamasqua Charisma blog post and scroll down. In that post, you’ll also learn how you can tell Illamasqua which product you want them to release early! (The collection is set to be released on September 6.)

Would you wear black polish in the summer? What’s your favourite black or black-combination lacquer?

I prefer brighter colors in the summer, and seldom have just black on. However, when layering some cool effect polish (flakes, glitter etc) over black one need the sun to perhaps show of the effect the best. However I love black in nail art, in combination to colors because the contrast of the black emphasize the brighter colors. And another thing, occasion and clothes can sometime decide as well.. Going to a party and have a bright I dunno red(?) dress on and don’t want to have red nails it can be cool with for example black nails on. 🙂Gelic’ nail art recently posted: Red funky french

That looks gorgeous. I like darker colours, and glitter is not bad (at all… :D), so this might be something I have to buy when I go on a vacay in the US this winter – if it’s still available by then 😉

I was thinking it would be cool if you took a shot of your hand a little farther away. Sometimes I think nailpolishes look quite different from “afar” than when you’re up close and personal with it, y’know? And this one, I think it’s a little hard to wrap my head around how clearly you can see the glitter when you don’t have your eye really close to it.

You’re right – sometimes polishes look different from far away than they do up close. This one still has the lovely glittery sparkle when you look at your nails at a normal distance. Very beautiful! 🙂 The silver glitter is very defined and you do notice each piece even when looking at a normal distance at your own nails.

How much do Illamasqua polishes cost where you are? Here, at Canadian Sephora stores, they’re about $18 CAD or so. Pricey, but certainly worth it if it’s a colour you love and will wear often. The quality is spot-on with Illamasqua.